Dithyramb in Context

Dithyramb in Context
Author: Barbara Kowalzig
Publisher:
Total Pages: 508
Release: 2013-06-27
Genre: History
ISBN: 0199574685

The editors look at dithyramb in its entirety, understanding it as a social and cultural phenomenon of Greek antiquity. How the dithyramb functions as a marker and as a carrier of social change throughout Greek antiquity is expressed in themes such as performance and ritual, poetics and intertextuality, music and dance, history and politics.

Reconstructing Satyr Drama

Reconstructing Satyr Drama
Author: Andreas P. Antonopoulos
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
Total Pages: 967
Release: 2021-07-05
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 311072524X

The origins of satyr drama, and particularly the reliability of the account in Aristotle, remains contested, and several of this volume’s contributions try to make sense of the early relationship of satyr drama to dithyramb and attempt to place satyr drama in the pre-Classical performance space and traditions. What is not contested is the relationship of satyr drama to tragedy as a required cap to the Attic trilogy. Here, however, how Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides (to whom one complete play and the preponderance of the surviving fragments belong) envisioned the relationship of satyr drama to tragedy in plot, structure, setting, stage action and language is a complex subject tackled by several contributors. The playful satyr chorus and the drunken senility of Silenos have always suggested some links to comedy and later to Atellan farce and phlyax. Those links are best examined through language, passages in later Greek and Roman writers, and in art. The purpose of this volume is probe as many themes and connections of satyr drama with other literary genres, as well as other art forms, putting satyr drama on stage from the sixth century BC through the second century AD. The editors and contributors suggest solutions to some of the controversies, but the volume shows as much that the field of study is vibrant and deserves fuller attention.

The Pronomos Vase and Its Context

The Pronomos Vase and Its Context
Author: Oliver Taplin
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 320
Release: 2010-08-12
Genre: Art
ISBN: 0199582599

The Pronomos Vase is the single most important piece of pictorial evidence for ancient theatre to have survived from ancient Greece. It depicts an entire theatrical chorus and cast along with the celebrated musician Pronomos, in the presence of their patron god, Dionysos. In this collection of essays, illustrated with nearly 60 drawings and photographs, leading specialists from a variety of disciplines tackle the critical questions posed by this complex hub of evidence. Thediscussion covers a wide range of perspectives and issues, including the artist's oeuvre; the pottery market; the relation of this piece to other artistic, and especially celebratory, artefacts; the political and cultural contexts of the world that it was produced in; the identification of figures portrayedon it: and the significance of the Pronomos Vase as theatrical evidence. The volume offers not only the most recent scholarship on the vase but also some ground-breaking interpretations of it.

The Context of Ancient Drama

The Context of Ancient Drama
Author: Eric Csapo
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
Total Pages: 500
Release: 1995
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780472082759

An easy-to-use guide to the nature and stagecraft of ancient plays

The Many-Headed Muse

The Many-Headed Muse
Author: Pauline A. LeVen
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 389
Release: 2014-01-16
Genre: History
ISBN: 1107653932

This is the first monograph entirely devoted to the corpus of late classical Greek lyric poetry. Not only have the dithyrambs and kitharodic nomes of the New Musicians Timotheus and Philoxenus, the hymns of Aristotle and Ariphron, and the epigraphic paeans of Philodamus of Scarpheia and Isyllus of Epidaurus never been studied together, they have also remained hidden behind a series of critical prejudices – political, literary and aesthetic. Professor LeVen's book provides readings of these little-known poems and combines engagement with the style, narrative technique, poetics and reception of the texts with attention to the socio-cultural forces that shaped them. In examining the protean notions of tradition and innovation, the book contributes to the current re-evaluation of the landscape of Greek poetry and performance in the late classical period and bridges a gap in our understanding of Greek literary history between the early classical and the Hellenistic periods.

Tragedy and Athenian Religion

Tragedy and Athenian Religion
Author: Christiane Sourvinou-Inwood
Publisher: Lexington Books
Total Pages: 580
Release: 2003
Genre: Drama
ISBN: 9780739104002

Stemming from Harvard University's Carl Newell Jackson Lectures, Christiane Sourvinou-Inwood's Tragedy and Athenian Religion sets out a radical reexamination of the relationship between Greek tragedy and religion. Based on a reconstruction of the context in which tragedy was generated as a ritual performance during the festival of the City Dionysia, Sourvinou-Inwood shows that religious exploration had been crucial in the emergence of what developed into fifth-century Greek tragedy. A contextual analysis of the perceptions of fifth-century Athenians suggests that the ritual elements clustered in the tragedies of Euripides, Aeschylus, and Sophocles provided a framework for the exploration of religious issues, in a context perceived to be part of a polis ritual. This reassessment of Athenian tragedy is based both on a reconstruction of the Dionysia and the various stages of its development and on a deep textual analysis of fifth-century tragedians. By examining the relationship between fifth-century tragedies and performative context, Tragedy and Athenian Religion presents a groundbreaking view of tragedy as a discourse that explored (among other topics) the problematic religious issues of the time and so ultimately strengthened Athenian religion even at a time of crisis in very complex ways-- rather than, as some simpler modern readings argue, challenging and attacking religion and the gods.

Nothing to Do with Dionysos?

Nothing to Do with Dionysos?
Author: John J. Winkler
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 438
Release: 1990
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780691015255

'The more we learn about the original production of tragedies and comedies in Athens the more it seems wrong even to call them plays in the modern sense of the word, ' write the editors in this collection of critically diverse innovative essays aimed at restoring the social context of ancient Greek drama.

A Companion to Ancient Greek and Roman Music

A Companion to Ancient Greek and Roman Music
Author: Tosca A. C. Lynch
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 564
Release: 2020-07-08
Genre: History
ISBN: 1119275474

A COMPANION TO ANCIENT GREEK AND ROMAN MUSIC A comprehensive guide to music in Classical Antiquity and beyond Drawing on the latest research on the topic, A Companion to Ancient Greek and Roman Music provides a detailed overview of the most important issues raised by the study of ancient Greek and Roman music. An international panel of contributors, including leading experts as well as emerging voices in the field, examine the ancient 'Art of the Muses' from a wide range of methodological, theoretical, and practical perspectives. Written in an engaging and accessible style, this book explores the pervasive presence of the performing arts in ancient Greek and Roman culture—ranging from musical mythology to music theory and education, as well as archaeology and the practicalities of performances in private and public contexts. But this Companion also explores the broader roles played by music in the Graeco-Roman world, examining philosophical, psychological, medical and political uses of music in antiquity, and aspects of its cultural heritage in Mediaeval and Modern times. This book debunks common myths about Greek and Roman music, casting light on yet unanswered questions thanks to newly discovered evidence. Each chapter includes a discussion of the tools or methodologies that are most appropriate to address different topics, as well as detailed case studies illustrating their effectiveness. This book Offers new research insights that will contribute to the future developments of the field, outlining new interdisciplinary approaches to investigate the importance of performing arts in the ancient world and its reception in modern culture Traces the history and development of ancient Greek and Roman music, including their Near Eastern roots, following a thematic approach Showcases contributions from a wide range of disciplines and international scholarly traditions Examines the political, social and cultural implications of music in antiquity, including ethnicity, regional identity, gender and ideology Presents original diagrams and transcriptions of ancient scales, rhythms, and extant scores that facilitate access to these vital aspects of ancient music for scholars as well as practicing musicians Written for a broad range of readers including classicists, musicologists, art historians, and philosophers, A Companion to Ancient Greek and Roman Music provides a rich, informative and thought-provoking picture of ancient music in Classical Antiquity and beyond.